For students only, and on this weekend only, the city thinks it is OK to turn downtown into a police state, where they will seek and destroy any attempt at having unsanctioned fun. Ridiculous.

Next: “If you look under 21 and have alcohol, you will be asked to provide proof of age.” It’s official, the Constitution is being thrown out that weekend. I’m 23, but people say I have a baby face, so go ahead, demand my ID — the Fourth Amendment is really more of a guideline anyway. Ridiculous.

The super-liberal Madison authorities go in for this show-your-papers business to thwart the freedom of individuals to associate with each other over music and beer, but let the GOP at the state level require IDs for voting and they'll say we've descended into a police state. I can just hear these "progressives" righteously lecturing about how requiring IDs for voting is really underhandedly a way to discriminate. But the police department's policy is openly discriminatory against the young (and — if you want to talk about what's really going on — I'd suggest that that it's underhandedly discriminatory against males).

I defend Mifflin more than any event we have, not out of some misplaced adolescent desire to get hammered, but because it represents everything about this school that makes me proud to wake up a Badger. Yes, our academics are awesome, but it is the social life here that sets UW apart for me. Mifflin happens to be the pinnacle of that life, and is, as it has always been, meant to be a celebration of everything it means to be a Badger.

Simply put, it’s just fun to get up early and party with your whole school after a winter of cold and two semesters of hard work at a top-notch university. To the powers that drove us to this point, I would ask that you pay attention to the entire reputation of this school, not just your idea of what that reputation should be.

It is a police state if the police do not block off your street, provide security, and re-route traffic so you can have a giant party?

Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness does not equate to being able to charge the city tens of thousands in extra police costs.

I would also remind this student of the stabbings of recent years, the riots of 15 years ago, and the many illegal acts he and his cohorts have carried out all in the name of the Mifflin Street Block Party.

I grew up in Madison, went to parties from the late 80's until the late 90's when there was nothing `neighborhood' or UW about it at all.

The Mifflin Party died almost 20 years ago. What it used to mean is not what it is, despite how much this student wishes it so.

Isn't the demand for ID among revelers discriminatory against minorities, as well? Opponents say one problem with voter ID measures is that it is more difficult for urban minorities to get state IDs. DMV offices are inconveniently located; the paperwork & bureaucracy are too difficult for many to navigate, etc. If procuring an ID is so difficult that it's discriminatory, so is any demand for identification--from voting to buying a drink.

There is nothing unusual here as the professor has come to appreciate, marinating as she has in this culture. "Progressives" are without irony and given to the removal of the rights of others. This is all for your own good.

There is nothing unusual here as the professor has come to appreciate, marinating as she has in this culture. "Progressives" are without irony and given to the removal of the rights of others. This is all for your own good.

Why are the Madison police on heightened security alert? Could it be that masses of drunks make a mess of things?

I defend Mifflin more than any event we have, not out of some misplaced adolescent desire to get hammered,

No - that's it. Group drunkenness is the best.

We used to have the "mall crawl" over Halloween, at our famous out-door street mall. It was great fun, but as the years progressed it became more of a show-up-&-get-piss-drunk-&-destroy-property-party.Amazing what a few nasty drunks can do to ruin a good time --and cause tens of thousands of dollars in damage to store fronts in the process.(then wiz away in your BMW)

In the past you could take the whole family. But the crowd control became outrageous. People were getting trampled.

It's fun to watch liberals lose control of what they hold dear by ruining it themselves.

My college was Southern Illinois University-Carbondale. For a heathy chunk of the 80's, we were always on that infamous Playboy's top ten list of party schools for really no other reason than our Halloween celebration.

I grew up in Chicago and participated in some fairly epic shenanigans due to that fact alone, but nothing really prepared the 18-year-old me for the unbridled otherworldliness that was SIUC's Halloween celebration.

It is a thing of the past, unfortunately, as the city and the state collapsed it completely. It's all but dead. Waking up in a field with a couple hundred of your closest friends is dead. Taking over downtown until 5am is dead.

Madison...it was probably fun while it lasted, but you're probably going to have wave goodbye to your beloved uberparty.

"Why don't we get drunk and screwI just bought a waterbed it's filled up for me and youThey say you are a snuff queenHoney I don't think that's trueSo why don't we get drunk and screwYeah, now baby I say, (lord!)Why don't we get drunk and screw?"

The checking id's and giving out MIPs is standard policy at the universities in Michigan and I believe Indiana.In Michigan, police stand outside bars and check id's and breathalyzer anyone that comes out. They watch for students walking at night, or for girls who have taken off their heels to walk home. They don't have to catch you in the act of drinking to ID and breathalyze.

The MIPs come with strict penalties, including requirements for ongoing "awareness" programs. Students can even be banned from getting jobs in education. My friends' daughters boyfriend had to spend time in jail because he could not afford the financial penalty. This a 20 year old who committed the unpardonable sin of walking down the street after having had alchohol.

This is not about drinking and driving. I find it appalling, and it sounds like it is headed your way.

Maybee hits at the core of the problem. The drinking age should be 18 as it was in Wisc and Louisiana, etc., years ago until being blackmailed by the Feds. Lowering the age would go a long way to ending the march towards Fascism. One is considered an adult at 18 for everything else--can sign contracts, own a business (even a bar), etc.--so it makes no logical sense to raise the age. The answer to this "under-age" drinking crack-down by many students is to hold giant house parties on private property, but this ploy has only led to police-state tactics of local police sending under-cover agents to invade the private property-based party. Additionally, it has also led moves by State Legislatures--especially in the wake of 911--to pass legislation making possession of a false ID a felony--thus insuring that the lives of many otherwise upstanding citizens with great future potential will be ruined forever--as realistically expecting college-age peoplenot to drink is like ordering the seas to recede..

(PS When I attended LSU ('62-'66) the big deal was to go escape the summer heat by going to summer-school at either Wisc or to Boulder (both States then having an age 18 drinking age)--Nothing like sitting at the Student Union patio having a cool one while over-looking Lake Mendota!)

"I defend Mifflin more than any event we have, not out of some misplaced adolescent desire to get hammered, but because it represents everything about this school that makes me proud to wake up a Badger."

Perhaps the students should build a large wooden badger, climb inside, and leave it out on Mifflin Street the night before.

Next: “If you look under 21 and have alcohol, you will be asked to provide proof of age.” It’s official, the Constitution is being thrown out that weekend. I’m 23, but people say I have a baby face, so go ahead, demand my ID — the Fourth Amendment is really more of a guideline anyway.

What does the Fourth Amendment have to do with that, exactly?

I mean, I think the drinking age should be dropped to 16 or removed entirely - but I don't see a Fourth Amendment issue with ID requirements given that laws specifying a drinking age in a State seem to be perfectly Constitutional.

I've been wi' a couple o' cronies, One or two pals o' my ain; We went in a hotel, and we did very well, And then we came out once again; Then we went into anither, And that is the reason I'm fu'; We had six deoch-an-doruses, then sang a chorus, Just listen, I'll sing it to you:

Chorus I belong to Madison, Dear old Madison town; But what's the matter wi' Madison, For it's goin' roun' and roun'! I'm only a common old working chap, As anyone here can see, But when I get a couple o' drinks on a Saturday, Madison belongs to me!

There's nothing in keeping your money, And saving a dollar or two; If you've nothing to spend, then you've nothing to lend, Why that's all the better for you! There no harm in taking a drappie, It ends all your trouble and strife; It gives ye the feeling that when you get home, You don't give a hang for the wife!